Visiting African entrepreneurs impress in business class

Rich Nadworny taught 25 African entrepreneurs at Dartmouth College this summery. They were in the U.S. as part of The Mandela Washington Fellows Program, the centerpiece of President Obama’s Young African Leaders Initiative, a State Department-led program.(Photo: COURTESY LARS BLACKMORE)

What does it look like when you bring 25 of Africa’s top young entrepreneurs and put them in New England to study design, innovation and business? It looks a lot like Hanover, New Hampshire and Vermont this summer.

Last month, I taught 25 African entrepreneurs at Dartmouth College. They were in the U.S. as part of The Mandela Washington Fellows Program. That’s the centerpiece of President Obama’s Young African Leaders Initiative (YALI for short), a State Department-led program that works to provide opportunities to “spur growth, strengthen democratic systems and enhance peace and security.”

This is the second year of the program. More than 30,000 Africans apply for the fellowship but only 500 are accepted to study at 20 American colleges and universities for six weeks of leadership training and mentoring in business and entrepreneurship, civic engagement and public administration. The focus at Dartmouth is design, innovation and entrepreneurship.

The members of my group were between 25 and 35 years old, and hailed from 17 African countries. And they were one of the most impressive groups of people I’ve met. They included doctors and engineers, teachers and community leaders, journalists and renewable energy developers. My time together with them focused on teaching and guiding these talented individuals through a class called “design-driven entrepreneurship” where we dug into innovative business creation through a human-centered design process.

The six-week program also included leadership training with the Rockefeller Center for Public Policy and team building with the Dartmouth Outing Club (including a day on the high ropes course). The fellows did storytelling workshops with Ashoka and attended business lectures by professors at the Tuck School of Business.

One of the best parts of the program was that the African fellows got to meet and visit with some of Vermont’s most innovative entrepreneurs, such as Hinda Miller who created the sports bra, David Blittersdorf of AllEarth Renewables, and Paul Budnitz of Ello. They spent a morning with Michael Jager of Solidarity of Unbridled Labour doing a workshop on brand strategy. And they visited some of best Vermont businesses including Simon Pearce, King Arthur Flour, Seventh Generation and Ben & Jerry’s.

In addition, they immersed themselves in the Upper Valley community through stay at home visits with people in the area. They also engaged in community service by volunteering at places like The Haven, a homeless shelter and food pantry, and Willing Hands, a garden and food production-distribution service for those in need.

All of the African Fellows are entrepreneurs in their own right: Kondo Moussa is founder of the weekly printed newspaper, L’Express de Bamako, and president of the nonprofit organization Giving Back Mali. Jamila Mayanja is the CEO of Smart Girls Uganda and founder of a franchise company called J Mobile Laundry Services. Washikala Malango of the Democratic Republic of Congo is founder and co-director of the Alternative Energy Technologies Distribution Company (ALTech). Cynthia Ndubuisi owns a social enterprise called Kadosh Production Company, in Nigeria to help female farmers produce recycle cassava waste. Each of the 21 fellows are just as impressive. (http://dickey.dartmouth.edu/people/cynthia-cyndy-ndubuisi)

Our hope was to help them move up to the next level in their entrepreneurial careers. We did that with a six-week focus, first with a short course on design thinking, and then a month-long course where we applied human-centered design principles and techniques to business startups. In line with Dartmouth College’s current emphasis on experiential learning, we made sure the fellows had lots of time to try and practice the various design techniques, working collaboratively on seven business projects. At the end of the month, they pitched a panel of Tuck Business School professors and Dartmouth leaders.

The business ideas and pitches were astounding, to be honest. I’ve witnessed my share of “real” startup pitches. The ones by the fellows were better than 90 percent of the ones I’ve seen. The real secret sauce, aside from the design techniques and the Business Model Canvas we used as a tool, was a relentless focus on people. People gave the ideas and designs a clear focus; people helped them understand the various partners and allies they’d need. The ideas ranged from helping poor farmers in Chad to raising the social economic status of poor street garbage pickers in Tanzania.

The Dickey Center of International Understanding at Dartmouth did an amazing job in creating this vibrant and experiential curriculum. It seems to me like this is too good to offer up solely as a summer program for YALI fellows; I’m sure American entrepreneurs and international development professionals could benefit from this as well.

I can’t wait to see what happens when these entrepreneurs go back home to share and implement their new knowledge. I have no doubt that their experience will produce great things.

Rich Nadworny is principal at Empatico, an innovation and design firm in Burlington. You can connect with Rich at www.empatico.us or follow him on Twitter @rnadworny.